


Counting Down the Days to go

by Snarkyowl



Category: DreamSMP
Genre: But things get better past their separate angst chapters i promise, Hurt/Comfort, Phil is the dad and the others are his sons, Sleepy boys INC but it's angst, Spoilers for the SMP if you aren't fairly caught up I guess?, Warnings for Depression and some dark themes!
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-13
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:14:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28053009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Snarkyowl/pseuds/Snarkyowl
Summary: Ever since Wilbur had died, ever since Tommy was exiled, ever since things went to hell in a handbasket life hasn't been right. This fic will follow each member of the family as they try and cope with the circumstances they've been thrown into, and eventually how they handle it as a family.
Relationships: Dave | Technoblade & Wilbur Soot & TommyInnit & Phil Watson
Kudos: 21





	1. The Heartache of a Father

Years of his life had led to a list of things he knew were certain in this world- undoubtable to the end of time and fact beyond fact. Philza’s list of things that were unshakably true was long, but only a few of the things found there were important to him in more recent years. The more important listings, of course, revolved around the boys that called him father and the people they surrounded themselves with. _And, as he considered the fact they did indeed still call him father, he had to wonder why. He was a terrible one, between killing one and favoring another to the point of almost completely ignoring his youngset, his fathership was hardly worth spitting on. Still, every letter he got had “Dear Dad” diligently written at the top of it. He tried to ignore how sick it made him feel._  
Wilbur, Ghostbur now according to anyone you might try and ask, did not enjoy loneliness. Moreover, Ghostbur did not like unhappiness and wouldn’t tolerate it for long before he either did what he could to forcibly fix it or he felt forced to leave to avoid it.  
Tommy was an angry child, not because he was immature, but because the world had never showed him enough kindness to be worth being kind to. Tommy was angry because he was hurting, he was drowning in so many things a boy his age never should have had to face.  
Techno was distant because he felt used. The world saw Techno as a weapon and he was right to feel the way he did- was right to leave them behind when they went against all he fought for. For them. He was hard to understand at times, especially by his brothers who simply assumed he fought for their causes and never for his own.  
His sons, despite their flaws, were his sons and he would conquer worlds if they so asked it of him. That didn’t matter, though, after everything that had happened as of late. 

Philza’s list is set aside, the father’s heart aching more now than it ever has before. He is alone in his home in New L’Manburg, considering for the moment what his prerogative is meant to be. Technoblade is on his own in the snow, grand plans unfurling at his feet as he loses himself to his retirement and his grief. Ghostbur drifts between lands like a vagabond, forever lost between those he thinks he knows but doesn’t really know at all. He visits Tommy when he can, offers blue to people in L’Manburg when he can’t, and in general seems out of place amidst the chaos of life. Tommy is in exile, turned away by those he trusted, those he loved, and the entirety of Techno’s speech about Theseus is beginning to connect far too well to their present life.  
Philza is their father, he is tired, and he doesn’t have the first clue what he’s meant to do for his boys. He has failed them so much already, he feels the situation can’t be rectified anymore. They see no flaws- or none they point out- and he thinks that scares him more than the rest of it does. Do they truly see him as infallible? The guardian they should respect and adore? He is no such thing, but do his sons know that?  
“Phil?” A quiet voice breaks through the melancholy, drawing him from his mind like a siren would call sailors from their ships. “You’ve been staring at that wall for almost twenty minutes- I-... I counted.” Ghostbur’s voice is so hesitant and crackled, broken and echoing in the small house. Phil lets out a hum, exhaustion tugging at his bones like a clingy toddler.  
“How is Tommy doing, Wil?”  
“Tommy?” The ghost blinks a bit before grinning, a shy little smile that spreads across his face and crinkles his eyes. “He’s doing alright… he’s looking a little rough but don’t worry! I make sure he has blue, and- and that he has some fun. I gave him a picture of the Christmas tree!”  
“That’s good,” Phil murmurs, despite knowing that that picture will only do more harm than good in the long run. Tommy doesn’t need to see the fun and the love in this land he was thrown out of- he doesn’t need to see how quickly life moved on without him around. It’s wrong and it’s cruel, but Ghostbur doesn’t understand. He just wants to fix it, and Phil can’t- _won’t_ fault him for that.  
“You could visit him,” Wilbur offers softly, in a voice that almost sounds like the one he had in life. Phil releases a feeble, sad little laugh at that.  
“No, Wil, I don’t think I could. I don’t think he’d want to see me anyway.” He sighed, rubbing his face wearily. “I have work to do here, anyway. So much to do…” As the exhaustion rolled over him again Phil considered, not for the first time, what might come to be if he chose to just fall asleep for a while. A coma, of a kind, that would let him escape it all for just a while. But no, he couldn’t do that. He was needed, and he’d missed far too much already.  
He wouldn’t leave his boys again.


	2. An Exiled Son's Agony

The sun beat down mercilessly upon the sands of the beach he now had to call home, the waves crashed slowly against the shoreline. Above his head, a seagull screamed bloody murder.  
Tommyinnit is incredibly fucking fed up with life on the beach. As nice as the dolphins and turtles are to watch, as lovely as the little colorful fish are, and as much as he enjoys having sand literally everywhere if it gets too windy, _he really doesn’t enjoy it_. Things aren’t happy here. He’s alone- he’s so alone and he hates being alone. Aether above he hates being alone so much- and no one ever comes to visit! No one but Dream.  
When everything started that was a problem, too, but unfortunately his mind had convinced him that Dream wasn’t half bad these days. Company was company, and while he did blow things to kingdom come… company was company. He’d take what he could get- even if it was a stupid mask wearing dictator. Whatever. 

Tommy sighed, scrubbing his face with a slight grimace. He’d seen himself, how he was… falling apart. His shirt was torn, his pants too, and his face looked like he hadn’t slept in years. Not to mention the fact that his eyes… they’d once been so blue and now? Now they were just shadows of that. A weak bluey grey at best, but he had a feeling that wasn’t going to last for much longer. No matter how much blue Ghostbur shoved at him, no matter how much Dream tried to visit and befriend him.  
No matter how much Ranboo encouraged him to keep fighting. 

At the end of the day it all seemed… worthless. Wilbur was still dead, Techno was still a traitorous bastard, and Phil still had yet to do a thing aside from stand sadly and silently at Wilbur’s funeral. He was supposed to be their father, their protector, and yet once again he wasn’t there when they had really needed him. It hurt, seeing Phil drift alongside Techno and yet never set foot on the sandy beaches of Tommy’s new home. They weren’t that far apart- so why hadn’t Phil come?  
Didn’t Phil love him, too? 

These days Tommy doubted anyone really loved him anymore, doubted that they cared beyond entertaining some kid to his face until he went away. It stung to consider- stung to realize that all of those jokes about him being the annoying child might not have been jokes after all. He hated to think he’d been a bother for so long…  
Tears gathered in his eyes but he wiped them away with vehemence, growling at himself for being so… sad. This was pathetic, honestly. “I’m a man,” he muttered, rising from where he sat in his tent. _Alone._

A long time ago, things hadn’t been this bad. He had loved his brothers, had loved his father. They got along marvelously, just a happy family of four. Tommy remembered those times fondly, remembered those times as the days Wilbur chased him with a wooden sword and cursed him out for being a “gremlin child.” Those were the days in which Techno would actually play with him, spar with him, and treat him like an equal. Like someone who could understand the thoughts that tormented the piglin hybrid, someone who felt the same sorrows.  
Now, Techno seemed to think he couldn’t understand much of anything. Seemed to think he was some kind of idiot- some kind of pushover. He was no such thing. He couldn’t be. 

Wilbur’s smile haunts him. 

They had been close growing up, and even closer following the establishment of their new land. When they were exiled, it had just been them. Two brothers against the entire world, and Tommy had been alright with that. He’d been happy, even, to be at his big brother’s side. He had felt so sure that whatever they faced they would beat, that nothing could or would stop them.  
_“My unfinished symphony, Phil! Forever left unfinished!” Wilbur had cried, his eyes no longer warm but rather those of a mad man. Wilbur was lost. Wilbur, his brother, was gone. And then he was dead, slumped in their father’s arms with blood spilling over a diamond blade. Tommy screamed to an audience that wouldn’t listen._  
Tommy gripped his hair against the memory, shaking his head wildly like a dog attempting to dry himself of water. “Get out of my head,” he begged, sounding almost as crazed as his brother had in his final moments. “Get out- please get out.” 

_“You wanna be a hero Tommy?” Techno’s eyes had blazed like the entirety of the Nether itself that day, cape billowing behind him as he stood in front of what would be L’Manburg’s final undoing. Wilbur’s explosion and now this? “Then die like one!” The world exploded to chaos as screams echoed all around him, the beasts rising before his brother like loyal harbingers of death. Tommy screamed, sobbed, water filled his lungs and he fought. He fought for a country that was already dead._  
“Stop!” Tommy screamed to no one but his own mind, desperately pulling at his hair in an attempt to make his mind shut up.  
“Tommy?” 

Dream. He stands there almost mockingly, a survivor of the chaos, a curator of it. He’d encouraged Wilbur’s downfall- he had damn near hand crafted it. And he had the audacity to stand here and call himself Tommy’s friend? But… he was all Tommy had. He was the only one that still came. Loyally. Every day, really. Nearly. Because of him, Tommy had something to look forward to.  
“Dream,” he whispered, hoping for some kind of salvation or maybe hoping to finally be killed. Dream just sighed, moving over and kneeling down beside him. For once there were no words from him, no assurances and no manipulations. Dream wrapped his arms around Tommy’s shaking frame, pulled him close, and as Tommy sobbed he just held him. 

Dream was not a kind man, not anymore, but even he was not heartless.


	3. The Blade's Isolation

Frost gathered on the windows like spiderwebs, collecting as the snow outside swirled down like gently dancing ballerinas. Technoblade, a creature born of fire and of blood, watched the snow with empty eyes. He felt like a ghost as he stood on the porch of the little house he now called his base, but then again perhaps he shouldn’t have compared himself to a ghost. Not after what happened to Wilbur. Not after…

The blade heaved a sigh, all too tired for a man so young, as he made his way out into the snow. His cape, smaller now with the change in uniform he’d gone through. He wore blue now, representing the land that he had once ruled over. Representing a land long gone.The Antartic Empire was a relic of a time much more bearable, of a happier era in his life. When Wilbur was alive and content with the state of the world, when Tommy was just a silly little boy yelling and making himself seem larger than life.   
Technoblade sorely missed those days with his brothers, he also missed those days with his father. Phil still supported him now, was still helping him grow as time went on here in this new frozen land, but it wasn’t the same. No, things were much different now. Phil had lost a lot of himself since he had _murdered, slaughtered, killed_ … since Wilbur had died. Techno understood that feeling. 

He sighed again, slumping his shoulders as if the weight of the world itself rested upon them. Was this the fate he had to look forward to? Isolation in a frozen tundra, building an empire that would never truly achieve much of anything against someone like Dream? Even if Dream had gathered more enemies than friends, and even if Technoblade had beaten Dream before, Technoblade held little hope.   
After Wilbur had died, after his brother who he thought so highly of lost his damn mind, nothing seemed right. The world was grey now, lost its splendor. Government had taken away again, and the anarchy he cherished so much seemed much more ideal now. Really, how had no one seen it? 

Tommy, sweet little Tommy, saw him as the villain now. Somehow he had become the traitor in the boy’s mind, though the Withers really hadn’t done much more than the TNT had. Techno understood the need to blame someone, the need to place his anger on something, but he just… wished Tommy hadn’t chosen him. While he can feign indifference better than anyone else, while he can pretend that when Tommy throws the hatred his way with curses and insults it doesn’t affect him- it does. It hurts. It hurts more than he ever wants to admit and he hates it, so much. His little brother shouldn’t have to feel that much hatred, shouldn’t have to be so angry with the world that he feels the need to make someone else hurt. 

Techno was tired. Techno missed the easy days where Phil laughed as Tommy stole one of Wilbur’s instruments and bolted down the halls with it. Missed when Tommy would climb into his bed in the dead of the night because he was having a bad dream and was scared to be alone but Wilbur was a heavy sleeper and provided no comfort and Phil was never home when it happened.   
Techno had enjoyed being the big brother. He had enjoyed providing safety and comfort for his siblings, defending them from the evils that seemed to follow their family like a dog chasing after a bone. It was tiring, Aether was it ever tiring, but it was rewarding beyond belief and it was the good kind of tired. The kind of tired that came from doing something worthwhile. Nowadays he was just… tired. Always. 

Exhaustion clung to him like an old friend and these days he hardly had the will to do anything about it. Sleep never helped, anymore. Nothing did. He just went about his days, collecting more materials to prep for a war he doubted he’d win. He visited Tommy, sometimes, to torment him and try to pretend nothing changed. Pretend his brother didn’t hate him. Pretend the other brother wasn’t dead.   
Pretend their father had been there so much sooner and had actually been able to do something for them. 

“Techno! There you are.” Phil’s voice came from above, and he landed with a soft huff in front of Techno. He smiled, wide and bright but it never touched his eyes. Didn’t even come close. Techno stared at him, blank for a moment before he forced some life to return to his eyes. Forced himself to seem like he wasn’t miserable. Phil could probably tell anyway, but there was the feeble hope that maybe it would be alright.   
“Phil.”   
“I just went out to Tommy’s little island and-”  
“Have you seen him?”  
“No… No I ah. I haven’t.” Techno frowned, unsurprised and yet still disappointed. He didn’t comment further, turning away and heading back towards his house. Phil wasn’t really made for the cold. Hadn’t been when they ruled the Antarctic, and wasn’t now. He’d be freezing soon and Techno didn’t have the heart to just watch him shiver.

“I just wanted to drop a few things off with you before I head back,” Phil explained as he began setting down tools and materials. Some food, too. Food that wasn’t just potatoes and bread. “I know that things can be hard to get your hands on out here.” His father added, and Techno just grunted.   
“Thanks, Phil.” Phil nodded, seemingly picking up on the fact that Techno just wasn’t himself today. When was he ever himself though? What was his norm?   
“Techno?”  
“Yeah, old man?”   
“Be safe. Please.” 

The plea shouldn’t have to be said. Phil shouldn’t have sounded so broken when he said it, but such was the state of their life these days. Wearily, Technoblade just nodded his head in some vague agreement.   
“Safe as I ever am, anyway.”  
As Phil vanished back into a snowy, cloudy sky, Techno sat in the snow and let his head fall to his hands. 

Things were never exactly peaceful in this family, but that didn’t make this any easier. That didn’t make it hurt any less to know that he was somehow at fault for the way things had turned out.   
Technoblade dropped his head back to look at the sky and wished that maybe someday his family would be whole again. Even just for a moment.


End file.
